Ski Areas > Northern Alps > Belledonne > Prabert > Rocher de l'Homme south summit
From the Col de la Mine de Fer? traverse to the south on the left bank of the valley under the Pic de la Pierre and Les Trois officiers. You only loose around 150 meters on the traverse so keep your climbing skins on. On the left you will see a bowl that leads to the steep north couloir that descends from between the North and South summits. Finally you pass a rock outcrop and you will see two couloirs. Climb the left couloir (looking up the mountain) if possible as it is less steep, however the right couloir often has better snow. Most of the climb can be done on skis although you may need to do the last 50 meters on foot.
The descent of the couloirs features in the Belledonne Haute-Route, a four or five day traverse from Chamrousse to the Pointe de Rognier.
| Mountain Range | Belledonne |
|---|---|
| Summit | Rocher de l'Homme |
| Altitude | 2755m |
| Orientation | North |
| Starting Altitude | 1336m |
| Vertical | 1700m |
| Maps | IGN n°3335 ET Bourg d'Oisans |
| GPS Waypoint | N 45.1883°, E 05.9870° |
| GPS Route | Google-Earth:Betta |
| Grade[1] | Danger: 2, Climb: TD-, Ski: 5.1 |
| Comments | The couloirs is around 55° |
| Snowboarders | Yes |
| Road Access | Grenoble > Brignoud > Prabert > D528 to the limit of snow cover |
| Refuges | Jean Collet? |
| Author | davidof |
We agreed to climb to the col de la Mine de Fer then take a look at the conditions, a choice between the Collomb, Ferrouillet and the Rocher de l'Homme. Maybe a day too soon to play the transformed snow Joker. The Collomb was tempting but the Rocher de l'Homme was untracked... maybe because it was covered in crust?
The traverse was over breakable crust but the couloir was old powder. The surrounding faces except for the north couloir, had all purged. Making tracks we were caught by Jibou from SkiTour about 50 meters below the summit. He had been following us at a distance since the Pont de la Betta and took over making tracks for the last steep meters.
Skiing down with Jibou the snow at the top of the couloir and high on the banks was a bit slabby but this gave way to a nice powder field lower down. Climbing back to the col the early crust was now nicely transformed snow followed by heavy powder on the north side of the col.
Ski crampons were very useful for climbing to the lac du Crop, particuarly the icy and exposed traverse. The avalanche risk was increased due to some light snow and in particular a strong wind from the east.
We climbed to the south summit then traversed to the north to watch Guy ski the steep north couloir. There was a corniche overhanging the couloir and north face. We used crampons and ice-ax for the climb. We then skied down from about 50 meters below the south summit.
We climbed left couloir (looking up the mountain) but skied down the right. Nice settled powder - you can tell by little waves on the surface - just a little dense in some places with hardly any tracks. Excellent ski. The early started avoid crowds on the lac de Crop although there were a lot of people at the car-park.
We took a photo of a large slab that had covered the normal route above the lac du Crop - not somewhere to get caught given that you could easily be swept into the lake. The weight of the snow had broken the ice of the lake.
Lower down the snow was smooth, hardly unfrozen then spring snow in the section through the brushwood. All very skiable.
Category: Trip Reports << Col de la Mine de Fer? | Prabert | Rocher de l'Homme north couloir >>